Allowances, Vitale cards, retirees abroad. The Minister Delegate in charge of Public Accounts Gabriel Attal unveiled this Monday, May 29, a vast plan to fight against social fraud. This will save money and double the adjustments by 2027.
Three weeks after an initial plan focused on fight against tax evasion, the executive tackles social fraud. ” Social fraud, like tax evasion, is a form of hidden tax on working French people “, denounced the Minister Delegate in charge of Public Accounts, Gabriel Attal, in a interview at Parisian. Social benefits fraud is estimated at between 6 and 8 billion euros per year according to the Court of Auditors.
The minister is giving himself ten years to carry out the project, with a first step: to have by 2027 “ twice as many results as in 2022 “. Adjustments have already increased by 35% over the past five years. Gabriel Attal promises for this the creation of a thousand additional positions during this five-year period and an investment of one billion euros in information systems.
The Minister has detailed measures in more or less short term. In particular, he wishes to strenghten » the conditions of residence in France, « to receive social benefits “. This means that it will now be necessary to spend nine months of the year in the country, against six currently, to benefit from family allowances or the minimum old age. It will be the same for personal housing assistance (APL), which only requires eight months of presence for the moment. Gabriel Attal intends to increase the means of Urssaf to limit fraud to employers’ contributions.
Merger between the vital card and the identity card
Another announcement, which will surely have concrete repercussions on the French, the government is considering a merger between the Vitale card and the identity card. A measure to fight against fraud in health benefits. ” We can imagine a model where, from a certain date, when you redo your identity card, it automatically becomes your Vitale card said the minister, adding that a prefiguration mission would be launched by the summer and could reach conclusions by the end of the year. On the other hand, the idea of a biometric Vitale card seems to have been abandoned, particularly given its cost.
Bercy also wants to target retirees living outside European borders in order to better identify those who have died but continue to receive benefits. Gabriel Attal recalled that more than a million pensions were paid abroad, half of them outside Europe, and 300,000 in Algeria.
>> To read also: Immigration law: the importance of immigrant workers
(With AFP)